


Dead Hearts

by PBJellie



Category: South Park
Genre: Alternate Universe - Foster Family, Character Death, Death, Foster Care, Grief/Mourning, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Kid Fic, Past Child Abuse, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-10-05
Updated: 2019-10-16
Packaged: 2020-11-24 03:37:51
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20901029
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PBJellie/pseuds/PBJellie
Summary: Karen and Tweek live with Mrs. Shelia Broflovski, South Park's resident foster mom.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hey yall. This has been in my docs for a while and it's an idea I'm really interested in (like all of my ideas lol) so I thought I'd post it.
> 
> This might get more chapters, but I really like this particular interaction.
> 
> Title taken from the song Dead Hearts by the Canadian pop band Stars.

"You're not real," I say, running my tongue over the gap in my mouth. I lost a tooth earlier, and while I was afraid that I swallowed it along with the lunch Mrs. Sheila packed, but it was stuck in the skin on my apple. Kenny says that apples were supposed to be crunchy, but he wasn't real either. 

"Oh, fuck, I'm not real?" Tweek jitters, sitting on the couch next to Kenny. Kenny is just grinning from ear to ear, like always. There is always something to smile about, he says. I force a frown, just because. 

"No, you're not," I cross my arms and look back at the TV in the basement. Mrs. Sheila says the basement TV room was a good place for me to play, and I like to be alone for at least a little bit. "You died," I over enunciate the word as an ad for toothpaste plays on mute. "Your daddy killed you with his gun." 

"I, nnnn, he didn't kill me," Tweek, who wasn't real, says. "He shot me in the arm. It hurt, but I didn't die." 

"You're a liar, too." 

"Someone's in a bad mood," Kenny chuckles and my cheeks burn. "Tweek used to play dolls with you, remember?" 

"I don't care if he played dolls, he's not real!" I shout, jumping off the couch and stomping toward the dollhouse Mrs. Sheila got me for Christmas. Or it was for Hannakuh? She says I don't have to celebrate Hannakuah if I don't want, and she puts up a tree and everything. The doll house is a two story, just like Mrs. Sheila’s house. My old house is more like the Barbie RV she gave me for my birthday. 

I have to admit that I like the Dream House better. 

"I'll, gah, I'll play dolls," Tweek says, getting off the couch and following me into my space. "I can only be one doll at a time, which sucks." 

"Did your arm get broken before you died?" I ask, looking in the bin of Barbies. There are five in the box, plus two Kens, three Kelly's, and a bunch of clothes. Mrs. Sheila made most of the clothes herself. The hems on the store bought clothes are not appropriate for little girls and the clothes don't need to be so tight. She says that we need something called decorum. I'm not really sure what that is, but Barbie dresses are all the same, even if my Barbie's don't have their knees uncovered. 

"I don't want to talk about it," Tweek says, picking up a Ken with brown molded hair. It isn't brushable, which was lame, but with only one hand, it's fine. Also, he isn't real, and I'm trying to get into the habit of not carrying what pretend people think. My doctor wants me to, but more importantly, it's what Mrs. Sheila wants. Mrs. Sheila packs my lunches and draws a smiley face on the fruit cup, not the doctor.

"Does dying hurt?" I slide red shoes onto a blonde Kelly with pigtails. Mrs. Sheila helped me cut her hair, so she'd look like me, and she even took a red Sharpie, which I am not allowed to touch, and marked a line on her cheek. We are twins.

"How would I know that, man?" He tries to make the doll walk but ends up dropping it and cursing. 

We are not supposed to curse in Mrs. Sheila's house. She does not like that. Not that she punishes us, or at least me. I get a firm talking to and sometimes she gets disappointed, but she leaves talking about grace and forgiveness. 

She talked to a guy named Abraham who I couldn't see when I told her that Kenny said ice packs were for pussies. She ends a lot of our conversations by asking him for stuff.

There's a little bit of what my teacher calls a double standard, but otherwise, it's good here. I can't talk to Kenny, but she asks Abraham with help with almost everything. She even asked him for help as ghost Tweek walked up our driveway and into the house. She closed her eyes, too.

"You died is why," I glare at him. 

"I want to be a kid if you're going to be one," Tweek huffs, dropping the Ken doll again. "Why aren't, nnn, aren't there any boy kids?"

"You're dead so you don't have a say," I look at the sling on his arm and stare. It is not polite, but I am curious. Why would a dead person choose to have a sling in the afterlife? Kenny was all broken, at least according to Mr. Gerald, and he still looks normal as he sat on the couch. Tweek must have been a freak. 

"His dad shot him, and you're going to be a bitch?" Kenny laughs, tucking his hair behind his ear. 

"No one is talking to you!" I shout.

"I didn't say anything," Tweek mumbles, recoiling, then wincing as he tries to tuck inward. His sling flaps, like the dumb bird Kevin brought inside after it fell out of a tree. Dad had said if a bird wasn't smart enough to fly on it's own, it deserved to die, and no one should help it. When Kevin helped it anyway, Dad grabbed it out of his dresser drawer, clenching it in his fist. He threw it outside, and it flapped for a little bit in the air, before cracking against the concrete. 

It didn't flap after that. 

Tweek looked like the bird did, right before it hit the ground. 

"That's not a good story, Kare-bear," Kenny sighs. "Think of a good story." 

"I'll think anything I want to think. It's my brain, I own it, not you. Not my fault Tweek looks like a sad bird," I snap, smoothing out doll Karen's hair. "I'm not sorry I thought it. I don't have to be sorry for my thoughts, Mrs. Sheila and Mr. Gerald said." 

"I look like a bird?" Tweek asks, looking down, and then at his arm. "I guess, nnn, there might be worse animals to look like. I could look like a slug, or a turtle, or like the neighbor's goddamn dog. I hate that thing, it just barks and barks, man, always barking." He waves the doll in the air as he speaks, his hair flopping in and out of his face as he animates his story. "I guess it's not my neighbor anymore," Tweek sighs. "Whose our neighbor?" 

"Tell him about Sparky, I bet he'll do another fucked up puppet show." I smile as Kenny talked, even though, according to my doctor, I am not supposed to engage. It's my brain, and I can do what I want, right?

"Stan has a dog. Sparky is a good boy, though." 

"One time Sparky bit Cartman in the nads," Tweek laughs, struggling to bend the doll in half with just one hand. "Me and Stan and Kenny gave him hot dogs after that, like the whole kind, straight from the fridge. They were too slimy, but," Tweek twitches in on himself as I stare in horror, "but Sparky liked them." 

"He's allowed to talk about me, you know," Kenny said from the couch. "He was my friend." 

No one else on the planet is allowed to talk about Kenny. Kenny is my brother, not Tweek's. Tweek is dead and he's not even bothering to talk with Kenny. He's rude, for starters. No one else, besides sometimes Mrs. Sheila talks about Kenny. The doctor and Mrs. Sheila, but mostly me. I am the last person to talk about him, not Tweek, the weird kid.

"He's not," I argued. "He's not allowed to talk about you. You're my brother and no one ever talks about you, especially not when talking about private areas and hot dogs. It's worse than the church ladies, Ken." 

"I don't like the church ladies, either," Tweek says. "Mrs. Broflovski says I don't have to go anymore. I might go to Hell, but at least no one will tell me how sorry they are." 

"No one is sorry," I say with a sneer. "Mrs. Sheila says they just want to gossip because they're petty." I don't call her Mrs. Broflovski because it's too hard to say, but Tweek, three years older at eleven, can say it like it's nothing. "She said that God knows what's in your heart, and that's how he knows if you deserve to go to heaven or not." 

"Jewish God seems cool," Tweek says with a short nod. "Catholic God is annoying. He just wants you to feel bad and give money, and I don't have any money and I already feel pretty bad." 

"'Cuz you're dead, right?" Got him, I think smugly as Kenny rolls his eyes in my direction. He is watching TV like it was a naughty video we aren't allowed to see, glued to the screen, looking up only to be annoyed. In these moments, where he is just as annoying of a brother as he'd ever been, it's hard to see him as pretend.

"I'm not dead!" Tweek shouts. "The doctor said he might have to cut off my arm, but I'm not fucking dead! Stop saying I'm going to die!" 

"Are you two alright?" Mrs. Sheila calls from the staircase. "I ordered a pizza and then I heard all this shouting. Do you want me to come down there? Do you need some help sorting out a problem?" 

"No, Mrs. Broflovski," Tweek yells up the stairs, "thank you." 

"Alright then, play nice." 

The door creaks closed, and I sigh in relief. Mrs. Sheila does not like me talking about death in her house, not even a little bit. "You could have got me in trouble," I say, as Tweek grabbed his Ken doll. The fact that the boy in front of me is probably real dawns on me, too. Mrs. Sheila only talks to people that are real, besides Abraham. 

Tweek is certainly not Abraham. I don't think he's going to make Mrs. Sheila's life easier like she asked. He grins a bit as he walks the doll through the house, using his thumb to pull open the oven. A little light comes on and he seems impressed that there's a fake fire in the fake oven.  
Abraham would be cooler than this, I am pretty certain.

"If Mrs. Sheila talks to you, then you're real." 

"Kenny would, nnn, he'd want me to make sure you didn't get in trouble. Kenny was my friend, well sort of. Kenny was my friend as much as anyone was ever my friend." 

"Kid's a freak, but endearing," Kenny laughs. "Makes a mean cupcake and is pretty reliable, even with all the twitching and shouting." 

"Don't call him a freak," I scold him, like Mom did when she caught him with one of Dad's magazines with girls on the cover. "It's not nice." 

"You can call me whatever," Tweek sighs, shutting the oven with his fingers, dropping the doll in the process. "I guess we're like brother and sister now. I've never had one, but I think we're supposed to fight sometimes. That's what they do on TV." 

"Kenny is the one who did it," I rush out, cheeks growing red. "I think you're nice. I'll ask Mrs. Sheila to buy the boy kind, if you want to be a kid, too."

No one, including Kenny, says anything.


	2. Chapter 2

Tweek goes with me to the doctor appointment the next day. Not with me, with me, but he rides in the car, in the backseat, even though Mrs. Shelia says he's tall enough for the front. He shrugs, well he tries to shrug but he can't really, not with his arm all tight against his side.  
  
I heard him whining from his room, the room down the hall, last night, that everything hurt. I could also hear Mrs. Shelia babying him. She cooed and hummed at him, just like she did when I had nightmares. Maybe Tweek had nightmares, but I don't think so. Eleven year old's don't have nightmares. Kenny and Kevin never had nightmares, not where they cried. They were obviously men, or in Kenny's case, almost a man.  
  
Tweek is a boy, and that's why he picked the backseat to sit. Grown ups ride in the front, just like where Mama was when she died.   
  
Sometimes it's easy to wish that Mama was in the backseat with me, but the doctor says that's not helpful. Because if she was in the backseat, where would I be? I wasn't big enough for the front, and Kevin and Kenny got broken right next to me.  
  
Not that Kenny looks very broken today. He never does. He's all buck tooth smiles and giggles as he sits in the middle seat between me and Tweek. Sometimes, when the car slows down he makes faces, taunting Tweek.  
  
I, being a mature little girl, as Mrs. Sheila says, do not want to hurt Tweek's feelings. It's not nice to make fun of someone, especially not after hearing them crying. It's not nice to bring up someone else's crying either, so I zip my lips and glare in Kenny's direction. Tweek frowns, but this isn't about him. This is about Kenny flipping the bird then laughing as Mrs. Sheila hums music from the variety station, which has a lack of variety.   
  
It's all 80's, but not the yelling stuff Mama used to listen to. It's upbeat but soft, and there's not a lot of drums. Maybe the lack of drums is making Kenny antsy, or it's making me antsy, because it takes all I have not to curse out loud and say a bad word like Hell or worse damn. I won't add a God to that, because that's is an especially bad word because it makes Mrs. Sheila's eyebrows get all scrunched up.   
  
"What bad music, huh?" Kenny asks, putting his feet on the center console, which is real leather. It smells like fancy part of the mall and Kenny is putting his feet there, the same feet that stomped in a mud puddle right outside the car. I bite my lip to control myself. I'm not going to yell in Mrs. Sheila's car, in front of a boy who I know for a fact was crying last night.   
  
"Are you alright, Karen?" Mrs. Sheila asks, checking the rear view mirror.   
  
The next part slips out before I can stop it, partly out of panic. For a split second it's Daddy's face and not Mrs. Sheila asking me a question. "Look at the Goddamn road!"   
  
I am not supposed to say Goddamn. It is bad. I know it is bad, and that makes my doing it even more bad.   
  
I am bad.   
  
"Karen," Mrs. Sheila's jaw clenches and I can see the veins in her neck from the backseat, from between the headrest and the rest of the chair. "Karen, honey, we don't say curse words. It is not nice."   
  
A little part of me, and judging by the way Tweek grabbed my leg, putting his one good hand on my knee and squeezing, Tweek too, is afraid of what's going to happen next. This has never happened with Tweek, so he's probably more scared, especially seeing as he's a cry baby. I look at him, frowning and he nods slowly, trying to talk to me in a code I only understand from Kenny and Kevin.   
  
"I'm sorry, Mrs. Sheila," I whisper, hanging my head. "That was wrong of me."   
  
"I understand your fear," Mrs. Sheila says slowly, not looking back. She keeps her eyes straight ahead, just like drivers are supposed to. She doesn't bring beer into the car either. I learned after the ambulance that beer and cars together are illegal. Maybe they should be illegal separately, too. Mrs. Sheila doesn't have any beer, not that I've ever seen. "But you shouldn't take the Lord's name in vain. I don't think you really want God to send me away, do you?"   
  
I'm not really sure where she got that I was asking her to be sent away, instead of just asking for her to drive the car. I don't want to fall down a mountain, not ever again, and I doubt that Tweek wants that either. He won't be able to climb out, not with one arm.   
  
He wouldn't even be able to drink the water that the lady in the red car gave me. I had to use both hands.   
  
"I don't think she knows what that means," Tweek spits it out like his mouth is chewing pizza that is too hot. "Ma'am, I don't think she meant to back talk. She seems like a good girl," Tweek twitches inward, his arm compressing into his side. He grimaces, but tries to flash me a smile anyway. "Karen is good, Mrs. Broflovski. Karen doesn't need to be punished."   
  
"No one is punishing anyone," Mrs. Sheila says as she parks the car. "Karen is not in trouble, but I do not tolerate curse words. There are better ways to express yourself. You're only children after all, and you should behave as such." I nod and pat Tweek's knee, like he did mine after I messed up and said a naughty word. "I'm sorry I looked at you while driving," Mrs. Sheila pulls the keys from the ignition and turns to make eye contact. "I know you don't like that."   
  
"I don't," I say, keeping my hand where it is. I look at Tweek, and for whatever reason Kenny is gone. He's not sitting between us, it's just the shiny black leather and light brown stitching of the center seat. I used to ride in the center, but I don't have to anymore. It's better not to be able to see out the front. If we ever fall down a mountain again, I don't want to see it.   
  
"I will work harder to remember that," her seat belt clicks as she climbs out of the car. "We can all work harder, huh?"   
  
"I won't say that word anymore," I cross the fingers on my other hand, the one not touching Tweek, just in case. If I accidentally say it, I don't want to be bound by that promise. I can't control accidents.   
  
No one can.  
  
"That's it?" Tweek turns to me, working his bottom lip in his teeth. I notice that his eyes have big purple smears and he seems worried. Is he worried about Mrs. Sheila?   
  
"I mean, I crossed my fingers," I whisper. "So I'm not like, what do you call it? Contractually obligated? I'm not contractually obligated to never say it again, but it makes her sad."   
  
"Don't make her angry," Tweek sounds like he's trembling, but he always sounds that way. Kenny used to call him a shaky little fucker, at least to Kevin in their room. I heard them laughing through the wall. Not recently, but before. 

"I won't," I sigh, then roll my eyes. "She's not gonna do anything but talk to Abraham, and I don't think he's ever gonna come over or anything."   
  
"Abraham?" Tweek's eyes flared, all pupils and whites. "Is he the dealer? Don't make him mad. Don't do that, Karen."   
  
"I don't know what he is," I stammer, looking at him as Mrs. Sheila hovers outside the car. "He's just a guy and Mrs. Sheila talks to him sometimes, when we make her angry."   
  
"That's not good," Tweek is vibrating like Mrs. Sheila's phone when she puts it on the table for game night. "Don't make her call anyone. It's bad. Bad things will happen, Karen."   
  
"Karen! Tweek!" Mrs. Sheila waits with her hand over the door handle from the outside, hesitating. "It's time to go in. We don't want to be late."   
  
"I don't care if I'm late," I smile as I whisper it under my breath. "I don't need to talk to that man for a whole half hour. They should put in some commercials, like they do with cartoons. Give me breaks."   
  
Tweek shakes his head, then opens the door. He's unsteady on his feet, like he's got water in his ears or something. When he gets out of the car, I fumble with the door handle, trying to think of a way to buy another five minutes.   
  
"Just open it," Kenny urges. I jump, looking back at Tweek's empty seat to see Kenny, dirty shoes on the leather, just like before. "Maybe you'll get some stickers."   
  
"I don't even really like stickers," I grumble as I climb out.   
  
"Karen McCormick," Kenny laughs, his full throated laugh where his belly jiggles and I know this without even looking at him, "liars go to Hell."   
  
"You'd know, wouldn't you," I stick my tongue out at him, then think about flipping him off. He deserves it, if anyone ever did, telling me I was going to hell for not wanting a dumb sticker from a dumb doctor.


	3. Chapter 3

Tweek spent his own time with the doctor, before me. Well, according to Mrs. Broflovski he wasn't seeing my doctor, he was seeing a lady doctor, because when he did an intake with mine, he cried. She told me to keep quiet of the crying part, then gently reminded me, that's what she always calls it, that I used to cry a lot, too.   
  
She always said it was normal to cry when you were getting used to something new. I don't know if it's true or not, but it made me feel better about crying in math class. My teacher didn't get mad either, she just let me go down to the nurse, where we didn't even talk about math, we just colored a picture of a Strawberry Shortcake until I felt better.   
  
I kept coloring even after I felt better, because I couldn't just leave her dress half finished. That didn't seem like a very nice thing to do.   
  
Plus I didn't want to go back to math class until everyone forgot that I had cried.

No one mentioned it, but maybe the teacher had the same talk with the class that Mrs. Sheila was having with me right now. Maybe everyone just wanted to be nice so they pretended.   
  
Is it the right thing to do to pretend everything with Tweek is normal?  
  
"Do I lie about his arm, too?" I ask, tugging on her skirt. "I told him he looked like a bird. Was that mean?"   
  
"It's certainly not nice," Mrs. Sheila said, straight faced. She didn't look angry, though, just serious. "Tweek's arm is in the sling because he got hurt. His father hurt him."   
  
"Oh," I nod, trying to piece it together. Did he refuse to eat his waffle so his dad grabbed him by the arm, pulling him back to the table, and then it broke? I felt like my arm was breaking when that happened, like it wasn't supposed to twist that way. He didn't say he was pulled though, he said he got shot. "He got shot?" I ask, to make sure that between all the chaos with Kenny and the Barbie Dream House that I remembered correctly. I'm a pretty good rememberer, but it's good to double check.   
  
"Yes," Mrs. Sheila says softly. "It's embarrassing for him, so don't bring it up."   
  
"He told me," I shrug, moving both my shoulders unlike Tweek. He looks silly when he shrugs, and he shrugs a lot in our games. "We were playing Barbies and he said he got shot by his dad."   
  
"Then why are you asking me?" Mrs. Sheila smiles, ruffling my hair. "Bubelah, he just needs our help, so we're going to do our job on Earth and help him."   
  
"That's our job?" I ask, trying not to pull away. Mama didn't mess up my hair in purpose, especially not in public. Mrs. Sheila does, and then she goes through the trouble of combing it back out with her nails. smoothing any fly aways back into their respective pigtails.   
  
"I think so," Mrs. Sheila nods, patting me on the back, then scratching between my shoulder blades. "I think God put us here to help other people, and then those people go on to help other people, or sometimes help us back."  
  
"How's Tweek gonna help us?" I snort. "What can Tweek do? His arm is broken."   
  
"Well," Mrs. Sheila kept scratching my back, even though she didn't seem to like this conversation. "I don't know how Tweek will help you, and the reward part isn't important, anyway. It's about being a good person and making the world a better place."   
  
"How does Tweek help anyone?" I ask, genuinely confused. He's eleven and was crying in his room last night. Kevin got to be fourteen and I never heard him cry, not even once  
  
"Sometimes people have to grow into their helpfulness," Mrs. Sheila sighs and I shrink inward. Her sigh is never a good sign. "You helped me with dinner, two nights ago, didn't you?"   
  
"I helped you put chicken nuggets on a pan," I whisper, feeling my cheeks flush. I feel a little proud of it, even though I know it's not really anything. Mrs. Sheila could have done it herself if she wasn't on the phone. She could have just dumped them out and hoped for the best, or even just waited to make dinner. Mama used to wait to make dinner, if she was too busy.   
  
"That's helpful. You we're being a helper. And you're going to continue the chain of helping people, and then the world will be better."   
  
"Will it?" I ask, looking back at her. "Are we really going to make the world better?"   
  
"Of course we will," Mrs. Sheila pats my back before crossing her legs and looking straight ahead. That means she is tired of talking and needs a little break.   
  
I start to brainstorm ways I can make the world better, fighting to keep them all in my head at the same time. I could get rid of mountains, beer and cars. That'd make the world much much better, I think. I'd like that world more. That world would have Kenny and Kevin, and even Mama and Daddy. I'd make Mama be more like Mrs. Sheila and Daddy more like Mr. Gerald. They'd be nice to me, and to each other, and we'd eat dinner together.   
  
We'd have game nights and I'd have a doll house, because Mama would buy me one. In a better world Mama would have enough money for stuff. Maybe we'd even do Christmas and Hannukah, because that dreidel game was pretty fun, especially the chocolate coins. Mr. Gerald gave me some of his, after the spinning was over, even helped me peel off the wrapper.   
  
I even liked the candles.   
  
They weren't the kind of candles Mama pulled out from under the sink when Daddy forgot to pay the power, they were tall and skinny. Mr. Gerald told a cool story, too, about how people lived in a cave and it was a miracle they had oil. He was a good story teller, even for the parts I didn't really understand.   
  
Kenny paid attention the whole time, which was proof it was good.   
  
Tweek came back to the waiting room before my name was even called, with tears on his face again. Was I supposed to pretend he wasn't crying? I could not mention he had done it before, but to pretend it wasn't happening before my eyes was something else.  
  
"It'll get better," Mrs. Sheila whispers, standing up and holding her arms open. She does that if she felt like you need a hug but doesn't want to make you give one. She never ever makes me hug her, so it makes sense she wouldn't make him.  
  
Tweek just stares, like that dumb bird. I turn away because I don't want to relive that moment more than I already have. All of it is awful, the bird, Kevin, and even Daddy.  
  
"You can give her a hug," I whisper when I sneak a look back and Tweek is rocking back and forth on his heels. "Only if you want to."   
  
Tweek is off like a shot, burying his face against Mrs. Sheila and crying. He's crying in public and he doesn't even seem to care.   
  
It's not regular crying either, it's big tears, and from the sounds of it snot, and just all around gross. Tweek is a gross boy making nasty noises against Mrs. Sheila and I am not allowed to say anything. I just sit next to Mrs. Sheila, waiting to talk with a doctor I don't even want to see. I used to cry after the doctor, but that was a long time ago, before Hannukah. It's Feburary now, so I'm obviously a big girl. I have matured, like cheese.   
  
Mr. Gerald says you have to age cheese, which seems a little nuts because one time we left some American cheese in the bottom of the fridge for like a year and it got moldy. It did not get better, not according to Kenny as he stuffed the slice in his mouth.   
  
"Please don't make me, nnrgh, go back," Tweek sniffles. "I will be good. I can be, I promise."   
  
"Shhh," Mrs. Sheila says that as a comfort, like she's mimicking the white noise machines all around the office. She doesn't mean actually be quiet. "Shhh. The doctor is here to make you feel better. It's good to talk."   
  
"It's not," Tweek shakes his head, stepping back and wiping his eyes with his one free hand. "I don't want to talk about it, and I don't want to think about it!" Tweek seizes in on himself, like a bug in a cartoon walking into a zapper. "No one accidentally shoots someone. That's not, nnn, it's not an accident and I don't want to talk about it like it is."   
  
"Do you think he did it on purpose?" Mrs. Sheila asks. Tweek nods, cheeks and eyes red. He looks sad, but also angry. He looks like Mrs. Sheila does when we go and visit Daddy every other month, driving through the mountains to get to where he's staying. He's probably going to stay there forever, according to what Mr. Gerald said once on our drive back. "I don't think your father would hurt you on purpose. Sometimes, we adults get need help working through things, and that's why he did it, not because of anything you did."  
  
"I lost the stash," Tweek grumbles. "I did stuff, and now I'm with you instead of at home. It's not fair."   
  
"It's not," Mrs. Sheila nods slowly, like she's trying to remember exactly what Tweek just told her. "It's not fair, but let's make the best of it. We can make cookies. We make cookies after sessions. How does that sound?"   
  
"Today we're going to make peanut butter cookies," I smile, trying to ignore that he is still crying.   
  
Mrs. Sheila takes out her phone as we continue to wait. She's typing fast, faster than I can type, and using both hands. I look over, covertly, like a secret agent and she's using quotation marks, which is what you use for what someone says. She's also typing Tweek's name over and over, and words like apparent drug handling, neglect, and attempted homicide.   
  
When they call my name, I drag my feet. The carpet makes static against my shoes and I can feel the hair on my arms stand up, but also maybe it's just my general dislike of the doctor. I've seen him like ten times, and he's nice enough, but he's sort of stiff, like a cardboard cut out at a movie theater. Mrs. Sheila took me to see Inside Out and there was a bigger than life Wonder Woman in the lobby, propped up against the wall.   
  
I don't want to talk to my doctor. They're the same, all stiff and papery, but my doctor is a lot less wonderful. He's nice. It's not that he's scary, I just don't have much to talk about. School is good and the house is good. Everything is good, so I don't know why I'm having to talk.  
  
"Don't be such a spoil sport," Kenny calls out. I turn back, shooting daggers to the chair next to Tweek, where Kenny is draped across it like a lazy cat. Stan Marsh has an outside cat, and sometimes it will lay in the sun in Mrs. Sheila's driveway. His name is Patches, and I get to touch her, when she's in a good mood. Stan says most of the time she's a bitch, so that's why I don't get to pet her often.   
  
I don't say anything back to Kenny as a follow a woman in Looney Tunes scrubs back to the doctor's office. I am not supposed to talk to him, and I'm not going to break the rules in the place the rules were made.  
  
"Pansey," Kenny taunts, shoes on the next seat. Shoes don't go on seats. Shoes go on the floor.   
  
"Don't worry," Mrs. Sheila sighs, patting Tweek's back just like she does mine when I turn back to look at Kenny again. "We'll figure it out." 


End file.
